And welcome back to Esco Confessions! I am your host Lily Monroe. Thank you so much
for tuning in today. Again, thank you so much for, you know, listening to me ramble and
talk about the adventures and hopefully you guys learned something from those podcasts.
Otherwise, my job here is not done, you know. And if I can just make you smile and hopefully
see me and book with me, that's awesome. Or you can follow me online, that's fine too. Yeah,
but yeah, thank you again so much. And today I'm gonna talk about London Part 4. If you,
if this is your first time listening to the podcast, I suggest you go to episode one or the
most popular one and give it a try, give it a good go. And yeah, if this is, yeah, if this is your
first time listening to me, go ahead and listen to part one of London. Yeah, so yeah, London is the
capital of Great Britain and it was my first time being out of the country by myself. Because
the first time I was, I moved to the United States with my mom, which was,
fuck we know, 12 years old, which was like in 2000, early 2000s. So yeah, and then the second
time I was out of the country was with this dance group and we had this, we represented Ukraine
in Ankara, Istanbul, sorry, Ankara, Turkey. And yeah, it was dance competition, I loved it,
Turkey was great, but yeah, this was like my first, first time out of the country by myself.
Which was quite an experience, because it's like when you're with somebody, it's so much easier
to figure out what to do, where to go, because if you don't know, somebody else will know. And if
that person doesn't know, you know something that they don't know. But you know, when you travel
solo, you have to figure out the language, figure out where to go, what to do, what to see, where to
stay, unless you pre-booked, you know, the hotel or Airbnb or hostel. So yeah, so after, yeah,
I, after I hung out with the kids on Shrek's Adventure, which was super awesome, by the way,
I went to, okay, I was still like, this is like my child, my inner child, but I love teddy bears,
I've always collected them, I also collect unicorns and souls, just kidding. But the last part,
or not, I don't know. But yeah, like I've, you know, as a kid, I've always collected teddy bears,
and I've always like, you know, I see the stores, build a bear, bears are us, or toys are us,
and I'm like, these bears are kind of expensive, but you pay for the experience. So
next to, it was kind of next to Shrek, near London Eye and near Shrek's Adventure, there was small
build a bear store. So, and I went there and I'm like, you know what, maybe this looks,
this looks fun, so I chose a bear. It was a hard struggle between like a regular beige looking bear
and a rainbow looking bear with little eyelashes. So I'm like, you know what, I'm gonna get a rainbow
bear. I still have no name for him, or it might be her, I don't know, it looks like a her, but
he's dressed in male clothes, so it might be non-binary or so. First non-binary, oh my god,
that is such a good idea. First non-binary teddy bear. Do you guys know the way the sales are gonna
go up? Oh my god. So anyways, I bought this non-binary bear, and then I'm like, you know what,
he'll be so cute if I'm dressing my Slytherin outfit, and I got a Slytherin outfit for him,
and the red Converse shoes, because I was wearing red Converse shoes when I first came to London, so
and I love red, and I love Converse's because they're so comfy, at least for me.
Even though my feet hurt, still Converse's are cool. The doctor wears them, and you are like
doctor who? And I'm like exactly, exactly my friend. But anyways, so yeah, I went to build a bear, and
got the rainbow bear, some clothes, and I also got him the costume that the Queen's guards wear,
and yeah, and I, yeah, it was so adorable, and I'm like, carry this bag with me, I'm like, fuck yeah,
I just got my bear some clothes, and I got a bear, and I put heartbeat on him, and made a wish for
the regular heart, and it was so cute, and I'm like, oh my god, that's amazing, cost me like $90,
but it's fine, and then I started browsing on Amazon on my phone, I'm like, I need to buy this
bear more clothes. These clothes are so much cheaper than the kids clothes, it's ridiculous,
but anyways, anyways, so after that I was walking around the, I was walking alongside the river
Themes South Bank, I think it's called South Bank, and I saw this, I saw a unicycle, and then I saw
this performer, and I'm like, you know what, the performer is kind of cute, maybe I should see,
you know, I was gonna go to Tate Museum, which I did after that, but I was like, I'm gonna go
after that, but I kind of stopped, and he's like, hey, how's it going? I'm like, oh good, good, he's
like, good, good, yeah, and then he, I feel like he's a comedian, because his performance, so like,
you know, he has stage presence, like you could tell if somebody has that, because he was entertaining,
he was funny, he was making jokes, and maybe he's a comedian, I don't know, but anyways, so he started
doing like tricks on, actually he did one, he did one trick, and I don't think anybody has done it,
but he's also a contortionist, so he got on a unicycle, which is a six feet unicycle, and he had
to use a box to get on it, so you can't just, you can't just get on unicycle without some kind of
support, maybe, I don't know, maybe three foot unicycle, I don't know, but it was six feet unicycle,
and he got on it, and then he put the tennis rack through his body, so he was skinny, he was a skinny
guy, and I remember he had to adjust his thing away from the audience, and there were some people
were behind him, so like he turned away from the audience, and then he's like facing the other
people, he's like, hey guys, how are you, and he just, he's dinged on, and turned to us, and then
and then when he put it to his ribs and nipples, he's like, my nipples are sensitive, and then he
dislocated his shoulder, and he's like, it's fine, it doesn't hurt as bad anymore, and he joked about
how his parents are so proud of him, which I'm sure they are, but yeah, he's, he was so cute and funny,
but he was married, so I'm like, okay, he was 40, but he was married, darn, yeah, but it's fine,
you know, I gave him a tip, and so now you can apparently tip people through Vanmora Cash app,
and it's, I don't know how long it's been like that, but like the street performers, not just
anybody, like street performers in general, and I'm like, oh, that's cool, you know, I don't have
Vanmora anymore, so I just, I just gave him like, a fiver, fiver, I think it's called, five pounds,
because I had 20, but I'm like, I gotta save it, and yeah, but he, I saw his head, one of his heads
almost full, I'm like, damn, maybe I should like do something, maybe I should perform some kind of
act, but yeah, he was so funny, and really talented dude, I was thinking, maybe he should be in Britain's,
you know, Britain's Got Talent, so yeah, and then after that, I went to the Tate Museum, and it was,
I don't know why it's, I don't know why it's so overrated, I walked in, there was display of used
dirty material hanging from the ceiling, it was a long, like, it was tall, but I'm like, what the
fuck is the point of this, and then I started going around, and some exhibits made me depressed, and
not good, because there were, you know, how some noises will make you feel agitated, and angry, and
sad, and depressed, and that's what it made me feel, and maybe it's called art, I don't know, but I
I didn't like to feel that way, and then, yeah, like, I just walked through the museum so fast, because
most of the work, it was shit, it was shit, I'm sorry, like, some of the pieces were not art,
artistic at all, and I understand art, you know, it's, art is not forever, like, certain art is not
for everybody, art is an expression, like, okay, well, why are you expressing the art with pile of
shit-looking shit, I don't get it, and some art exhibits were cute, but, you know, after being in
the National Gallery, where everything was painted with hand from famous people, and, you know, like
Leonardo da Vinci sketches, and, you know, like, paintings, paintings, and yeah, like, I get it,
I might be a hypocrite, but, you know, it's, there's art, there's art, and then there's art,
and it was modern art museum, and I'm like, I fucking hate modern art, some of it is good,
but some of it is just shit, so, and then after that, after that museum, I ubered too, because my legs
are killing me again, third day or fourth day in a row, fourth day, yes, so I took a uber to the
National History Museum, oh my god, it was overcrowded, oh, oh, fun fact about the,
the touristy museums in London is that they are free, but the donations are always,
you know, preferred, so I was like, oh my god, this is so cool, like, it was a huge museum,
if it was in America, that, the museum, the entry would have been at least 30 dollars, so I'm like,
this is so cool, so, although one, the one of the exhibits was like 15 bucks, but it's, sorry, 15
pounds, but it's fine, it was nothing, because there was just so much to see, there were three
or four floors, and it was a lot of walking, it was a lot of information, and I did learn some things,
but I was also very tired, I worked around that museum like I was a zombie, because it was almost
five o'clock, and I was, I was up since six a.m. that day, and, yeah, but, yeah, but there was a lot
of cool stuff in there, there were a lot, a lot of cool stuff, it's history, it's, you know, there
was medicine, technology, science fiction, you know, aviation stuff, there wasn't really art,
but there was a lot of, there was so much information, I'm like, I'm feeling very overwhelmed,
so I kind of just walked through it, and I remember getting so pissed at some kids,
and people who did not say excuse me when you passed through them, and they were tourists,
I could tell they were tourists, because they did not say excuse me, they weren't polite,
so I'm like, okay, whatever, and the kids, I swear, some people are not allowed to have kids,
there was this black lady with two children, I'm not being racist, there was white person there too,
her husband was white, and they could not control their kids, because they kept making noises and
running around, and I swear people, I don't know, maybe, maybe it's the culture, maybe it's the,
the way that I was raised, but if you cannot, like, like some kids need to be spanked,
just saying, like, because, hey, stop it, would not do it, so anyways, so there were a lot of
tourists and lots of people in that museum, which kind of, I don't know, maybe it's overwhelming
for me, when there's too many people, like, if there's like, if people are scared, that's fine,
like, I'm fine making small conversations with them, but if there's shit on people,
shit on people, oh my god, I get so overwhelmed, maybe it's, maybe it's the introvert in me, or
just, well, it's just me, yeah, but anyways, after, after that museum, I just, I was like,
I'm like 40 minutes driving from home, and I do not feel like taking a tube and figuring the shit
out, I was exhausted, so I took, so I took an Uber there, and it was like 35 pounds, which is,
which is 43 dollars, with the, let's see, 35, 43, 48, so I'm like, whatever, it's fine,
Uber is convenient, it's faster, except that day, it was not fast, there was so much traffic, and,
and, but you know, it's fine, I actually paid less than what it was supposed to be worth, so,
and on the way, on the way home to the Airbnb, which is still probably home, I, you know, I asked
him about the rent, because I was curious, you know, I'm curious about a lot of stuff, and I asked him
about the rent, I asked him about food, I asked, I asked him about dating culture, he's like, yeah,
everybody uses apps, rent is, you know, if it's outside of London, it's like, sometimes it's 900,
on the website I saw 700, so it's not bad, it's not bad at all, and yeah, I did talk about rent in,
I think, first or second podcast, but, or first or second part of this podcast, but yeah, yeah,
and he was really friendly, and he was so apologetic, he's like, I'm sorry, this is
sick and sore, I'm like, I'm fine, I am in no rush, no worries, I'm just relaxing, and,
because I was, I was just looking around, I slept a little bit, I think, and I was dressing my teddy
bear in some clothes, so yeah, it was a good ride, it was a good ride, yeah, so, yeah, and then I got
home, I slept, I'm like, I'm so tired, I'm just gonna take some rest, so I rested on day five, and
yeah, and more adventures to follow up, so stay tuned.